The orderly storage of a variety of coils of lengths of lines has been a desired goal of virtually every professional craftsman and even the average homeowner.
Typically cords such as electrical extension cords are coiled and placed on a hook on a wall in a garage or workshop. Every homeowner typically has a variety of such cords, cables, hoses and ropes that need to be stored and readily available for use.
In U.S. Pat. No. 5,881,436 entitled “Portable Line Harness” and in U.S. Pat. No. 5,075,932 entitled “Cord Holder” two virtually identical storage devices are shown.
The device as described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,075,932 has a length of a highly flexible strap material, such as a textile fabric woven for example from a synthetic fiber which provides a strap which engages opposite ends of a two piece buckle in a manner providing a relatively large loop for encompassing a coil of electrical extension cord, either wholly, as bunched together in an elongated, closed coil, or partially, at one side of the coil, if the coil is circular and open at the center.
The buckle has one female part, which is recessed, to receive an elongate male plug-in member with flanking resilient catch members of the male buckle part in buckling the loop of strap about the coiled cord.
The device of this prior art invention has one end portion of the strap passed through a conventional strap-bight-forming and cinching slide fitting, then through a slotted receiving end of the first buckle part, and then was turned back on itself to again pass through slide fitting and to extend freely therefrom. To the free terminal end of such strap end portion was secured as a D-shaped ring to hang the device and its attached electrical cord from a hook for storage.
While these patented straps were a good improvement over ties, string and hooks mounted on walls to store a coil of cord, they provided no means to organize a plurality of such cords except by providing multiple hooks in the walls. Secondarily the devices provided almost no way to organize such cords in a vehicle.
Often professional craftsmen will need to carry many lines and cords to a work site, accordingly a simple way to keep coils secured and stored in a vehicle would be very desirable. Typically such coils of cords are just thrown in the back of a truck or on the bed or floor of a vehicle in piles or bundles. Often the cords get intertwined and tangled together creating a mess. Other times cords are left at a work site as there is no organized storage method to see what cable, cord, hose or rope is missing.
The average consumer fails to appreciate the rather large investment he has in electrical, acoustic or cable cords or welding cable and water hoses. However, improper storage and damage to those components costs a lot of money. For the professional craftsman both the damage issue and the lost time in untangling multiple lines results in substantial cost. Accordingly a simple, but improved cord or cable organizer that can store two or more separate lines is needed. The device described hereinafter fulfills this need with a remarkable versatility that provides an optimal organized storage and transport portability.